


Deal

by sheafrotherdon



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-13
Updated: 2006-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-11 23:20:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/118277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/pseuds/sheafrotherdon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set after 3x14 – John tracks Rodney down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deal

John passes a hand over the crystals by Rodney's door and waits three whole seconds before he walks inside. Rodney's sitting on his bed, hunched over a laptop, face creased with concentration, one finger following something on his screen. He glances up.

"Hi," he offers, and continues squinting at his computer.

John lifts his chin in greeting, then folds his arms and studies the photos and diplomas on Rodney's wall. "So," he manages after a while.

"Hmm?"

"You eat?"

"Oh – yeah, I – " Rodney gestures, a roll of wrist and flick of fingers. "I crashed some. Not really hungry anymore."

"You need Carson?"

Rodney shakes his head. "I need a dose of – " He looks up from his laptop and his frustration is obvious. "I don't understand any of what I wrote. Nothing. Not a line of code, not a fragment of an equation, it's all just . . ." Another gesture. "Gibberish."

John grimaces. "Sucks."

"Yeah."

John scratches the back of his neck and looks back at the photos again. "So – you need anything?"

Rodney sighs heavily and shakes his head, shutting the laptop and sliding it onto his bedside table. "I figured I'd just – " He nods at his pillow. "Didn't sleep much. The highs of forcibly induced physiological evolution didn't leave me a lot of downtime."

"Sure." John clenches his jaw, releases it again.

"You need something?'

"Just checkin' on you."

Rodney gives a soft, humorless laugh. "No more superpowers. Hardly a danger to anyone."

John frowns. "Not what I meant."

"No." Rodney sags a little, rubs his hands on the knees of his pants. "No, I know."

There's silence for a moment as John looks around the room, catalogs the piles of journals, the jumbled highlighter pens, scattered notebooks, and three back-up laptops idling at the desk. "You're okay then."

"Tired."

"Well I should just – " he hitches a shoulder, stalling. "Leave you to it." He turns toward the door.

"John?"

He turns around, eyebrow raised.

"I just – I wanted to say . . . thank you. Again. For trying." Rodney lifts his chin. "I know I'm not the easiest person to – and the idea of meditation and – " He wets his lips. "Still, you were willing to fight for me and that means a – great deal."

John narrows his eyes warily, but nods.

"So – so I – " Rodney gets up, steps forward and extends his hand. "Thank you."

It takes a moment for John to realize Rodney wants him to _shake his damn hand_ , and just as he looks back up and sees doubt creep onto Rodney's face he snaps, decides with the full force of god-only-knows-what that this is _it_ , he is _done_. And growling just a little at the back of his throat he steps forward, reaches out, takes Rodney's face between both his hands and kisses him hard. It's graceless, brief, a press of lips, but when he's done he doesn't turn away – he stares instead at Rodney's wide eyes, his parted mouth.

"You – you just – " But Rodney's body apparently has less trouble assimilating new information than his mind right now because he's already leaning into John's personal space, kissing him back, and this is different – rough and harsh and more than a little aggressive, stubble sliding over stubble, and John still has his hands cupping Rodney's jaw. He can smell the faint, sharp scent of the infirmary on Rodney's skin despite the overlay of fresh-used soap, and he hates that Rodney's been trying to scrub memory from his body, to wash away separation and illness. Everything else comes crashing in – the great pounding waves of shock and disbelief that have had his gut knotted since he stood at the bottom of Rodney's bed and prepared to see him die. He finds it in himself to pull back, leans his forehead against Rodney's, and pauses, breathing hard.

"Don't ever – " he begins, voice rough with a soft menace that's born of fear, but it's the most he can articulate before Rodney covers his mouth with his own again, just as raw and needy as the last time. It takes a while, but eventually the kisses slow, drag out, become softer, until they're nothing but a brush of lips and a burst of breath, the graze of someone's nose against someone else's cheek, and John has his eyes closed tight. He swallows hard, waits for there to be distance between what they've said and done and the words he has to say next because they're burning at the back of his throat. "If you ever do that again – "

"You'll what?" Rodney challenges, breathing hard. "Kiss me again?"

"What?"

"Strange sort of punishment," Rodney says, and John opens his eyes.

"Yeah?" John says defensively.

"Yeah."

"Yeah well – " John brushes his thumbs over the angle of Rodney's jaw. "Deal." He sounds like he's fifteen again.

"Yeah?" Defiant.

"Yeah." A promise.

Rodney looks pale, scared out of his mind, but he reaches for John's belt, fumbles with the buckle.

"You move pretty fast," John chokes out.

"You wish," Rodney says, gently letting the belt, John's gun, his knife slide to the floor. He hooks a finger inside the waistband of John's pants, pulls him to the bed. "Just – " And they tumble onto the too-small mattress, an awkward pile of elbows and knees and ribs and hips before they slide and shift and wind about one another, matching pieces; a close, gentle fit.

John doesn't move. It feels good to have Rodney's weight against him, to have him substantial and broad where there might have been nothing but 'remember when . . .'

"You're shaking," Rodney observes, voice muffled by John's neck.

"You almost died," John retorts in the sort of voice he might have used to tell someone they smelled in fourth grade.

"I was – " Rodney's still in comparison to John's trembling. "Glad you were there."

John blinks.

"To – be what I saw. Before –"

"Jesus, Rodney," and John kisses him again, urgent, clumsy, fingers sliding beneath Rodney's chin, tipping up his face. "Just – don't fucking _die_ on me, okay?"

Rodney nods, pulling his chin away sharply to mash his face against John's shoulder. "Okay."

"Okay." John's hands graze Rodney's back, the bumps of his spine, the breadth of his shoulders.

"We're hugging," Rodney says, sounding vaguely disturbed.

"Yeah, well – " John swallows. "Deal."

"Deal?"

John thinks, then huffs a breath of broken laughter. "Think of clear blue skies."

Rodney lets out a soft laugh. "I'm so there," he whispers, and holds on.


End file.
